Quilting leads to quilt guild membership. Knitting leads to knitting club. Quilt guilds and knitting clubs lead to making new friends! And new friends teach us new skills!
Here’s the story…
A couple weeks before the holidays I was watching Mayim Bialik’s YouTube channel. I know, I know…some of you are saying Mayim Bialik? Yes, ok, because she is brilliant! I think she is quirky in most of the right ways. I get right behind her sarcasm and ferocious love for her kids. I’m still trying to comprehend how she never used diapers when her babies were little…YouTube it, it’s a thing.
I digress.
During one of my mornings with Mayim I watched her make latkes. They looked so tasty! Mayim’s latkes got me thinking I should make those for our holiday meal. Our holiday meals are traditional in the sense that we traditionally try something new every year…latkes seemed like the perfect option!
A few days later I was at our weekly knitting club at my friend Susie’s house. We were discussing holiday plans and the conversation included what we were planning to cook (or, in my case, watch my husband cook). I mentioned the latkes and lo and behold, my friend Susie started talking about her latkes being famous at their Hanukkah meal. Susie said her latkes are so good that her daughter requests they be sent to Emory University in a box! So I asked her to teach me…and teach me she did!
Susie said the trick to fabulous latkes is two things: duck fat (preferably flavored with garlic and onion) and a stainless steel electric skillet in which to fry the latkes. She loaned me one of her beloved skillets and I began scouring the town for duck fat right away! Several phone calls and two stops later I found the duck fat! I gave an arm and a leg for it but it was worth it!
I bought two jars of duck fat and set about infusing it with garlic and onion. I set the electric skillet to low and simmered the onion and garlic for several hours (we made Christmas cookies in the interim).
Then, on Christmas day after we returned from a fabulous day of skiing, I got to work frying up the latkes.
Here is Susie’s ratio:
2 potatoes, peeled and grated
1 onion, grated into a paste
1 egg
Potato starch, only if needed to thicken
The task is to press the potatoes together and really flatten them out before frying. Susie says to fry them up “deeper than golden brown”. I think they turned out great:
More importantly, they tasted absolutely wonderful! Most importantly though, when I showed my photos to Susie she approved! Yay!
The Gyde Zoo 